


variations on a theme

by schweet_heart



Series: Avengers Fic [8]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: OT3, Other, Pepperstony - Freeform, Post-Movie, Threesome, m/f/m
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-28
Updated: 2013-08-28
Packaged: 2017-12-24 22:28:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,849
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/945384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/schweet_heart/pseuds/schweet_heart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony runs numbers in his sleep and sometimes he thinks in binary, but whichever way he tries it the equation always comes out wrong.</p>
            </blockquote>





	variations on a theme

**0.**

 

Tony runs numbers in his sleep and sometimes he thinks in binary, but whichever way he tries it the equation always comes out wrong: one saint-like supersoldier plus one badass billionaire equals nothing but trouble. And lo and behold, the first thing out of Rogers' mouth is a reference to Tony's father, something stupid about how much he loved working with his old man, and one day Tony's going to get tired of being right all the time but today is not that day.

  
“Dear old Dad,” Tony says over the handshake, with enough bonhomie that even Rogers has to know something's up. “Tell me all about your exploits together. I think I can fit you in between the dentist and my regularly scheduled trip to the bowels of hell.”

 

The other man's smile falters and he looks to Fury for clarification but the Director is rubbing the bridge of his nose and appears to be warding off a migraine.

 

“Your father was a good man,” the Captain says finally, lifting his hands in a helpless gesture that probably ought to have appealed to Tony's better nature. “I was sorry to hear about his death.”

 

“That makes one of us,” Tony says, and smiles.

 

**1.**

 

The next time they meet it's nothing but professional – well, if that profession were the kind that dealt in third degree burns. Tony figures it's just as well; he's used to working with people who put up with his mouth for the sake of his brain, so anything else might prove distracting. And as a team, yeah, they do all right, because Cap's easy to read and not hard to anticipate, and if Tony half wishes that he'd taken the guy up on his offer to go a few rounds (with or without the suit, hell, clothing optional) he doesn't dwell on it. Aliens to conquer, cities to save, yadda yadda yadda.

 

**1.**

 

Of course, you save the world with a guy you can't go on hating him. It's, like, bad superhero etiquette or something. So Rogers doesn't apologise for the things he said and Tony doesn't hold it against him, and they shake hands when they part ways like maybe they've learned to respect each other, just a little bit. Tony decides the Captain's good in a fight and good in spandex, which is a talent few people have in this day and age, and maybe nearly killing himself did some good because when they meet up again there are no more cracks about laying down on the wire, and everyone gets along, sort of – they manage to tolerate each other.

 

**2.**

 

Bruce is Tony's favourite Avenger by far, and not just because of the Hulk factor, although the whole giant-green-rage-monster concept is still wow, _seriously_ , if it didn't mean exposing himself to a lethal dose of gamma radiation he would so be getting one of those. The point, though, is that Bruce is pretty awesome in his own right, in spite of the quiet and unassuming thing he has going on. Bruce understands science, for one thing; he understands what it's like to be able to watch the numbers dance in your head, the ability to see _patterns_ in things most people wouldn't think to connect. He doesn't get upset if Tony cuts him off in mid-sentence to start sketching theories on a napkin or blows off their plans because he's got it, that itch, the feeling that he's _almost_ on the verge of something momentous. Bruce understands all these things.

 

He is also, unfortunately, nice. It's his single greatest failing.

 

“So I was thinking,” he says, over the sounds of the welding torch and AC/DC blaring through the speakers. “We should invite the Captain over.”

 

Tony looks at him for a second, and waves the music off.

 

“You were thinking what now?”

 

“I said, we should invite Steve over. You know, for dinner or a movie or something. I can't help feeling the guy must be lonely.”

 

“No.” Tony says flatly.

 

“Come on, Tony. I know you two don't get along, but – “

 

“The man is a kill-joy. He is the opposite of fun. Why would I want to spend any more time with him than I have to?”

 

Bruce has clearly been spending too much time with Pepper, because he has her disappointed expression down pat.

 

“I don't know that I want to have this conversation with you while you have that welding torch in your hand pointed straight at me,” he says.

 

Right. Right. Friends don't threaten friends with power tools. He's fairly sure he's heard that somewhere. He puts the torch down, and then because _come on_ it's not like he'd ever _deliberately_ hurt anyone with it, he picks it up again and flicks it off at the wall. It makes a convenient pointer, which he uses to prod Bruce in the chest. “Well?”

 

Bruce sighs.

 

“I don't know if you've noticed, Tony, but the man just woke up to find himself 70 years in the future. He's lost everything and every _one_ he ever knew. Don't you think you might have been a little hard on him?”

 

“How come no one ever asks if he might have been a little hard on _me_?”

 

“Have you met yourself recently?”

 

Tony puts a hand to his chest. “Oh, Doctor Banner, I do believe I'm hurt.”

 

“Good.” But Bruce is smiling, and Tony figures he has successfully diverted the conversational flow until the physicist shakes his head. “He's a good guy, Tony. Just promise me you'll think about it.”

 

“Okay,” Tony says. It isn't a lie; he will think about it. For about five seconds. “Fine. I'll think about it.”

 

Which is kinda-sorta-maybe how Steve ends up moving in with them.

 

**3**

 

It happens quite suddenly and it's definitely Bruce's fault. Tony is perfectly clear on that part. He keeps pestering Tony to at least invite Steve over for dinner, which Tony resists until Pepper gets in on the act. Having two sets of imploring, slightly disapproving expressions directed at him 24/7 is enough to overthrow even his valiant spirit, so he gives in with bad grace, and because they insist the invitation will mean more coming from him (technically it's still mostly his tower) he calls Steve and invites him over. He tries to ignore the fact that Steve sounds surprised to hear from him, surprised and _pleased_ , and worse still that when he hangs up he has that warm fuzzy feeling in his chest that Pepper insists comes from _doing the right thing_ and not because the arc reactor still needs a bit of tweaking. He's not sure he believes her.

 

Steve shows up early, impeccably dressed, his neatly pressed khakis and crisp shirt skating the edge of formal. And he brings a _gift_ , for fuck's sake, a bona fide geranium or whatever in a little pot that Pepper puts on the table with noises of thanks and Tony wonders how his life became something out of a 1950s sitcom. He blames Bruce. Again.

 

But the really bizarre thing isn't the plant, okay, it's how almost-normal it is to have Steve there. Once he gets over his politeness (which, Tony is interested to see, is genuine but also skin-deep; Steve is nice but not timid) Steve is actually quite good company, and when Pepper takes Tony aside in the kitchen and kisses him and tells him she's proud of him, he figures the evening might actually be a success.

 

“So, where are you staying, Steve?” Pepper asks, lifting her chopsticks gracefully to her mouth. Both Tony and Steve, to Bruce's amusement, have to make do with forks.

 

“Oh, SHIELD has set me up with a small flat out in Brooklyn,” Steve tells her. “It was really nice of them. Although I think partly it was because they just wanted to keep an eye on me.”

 

“Do you like it?”

 

“It's a little...” he seems to struggle for a word. “Bland. But I make do.”

 

“You should move in here,” Tony says, around a forkful of chow mein. He's so preoccupied with his food that at first he doesn't notice the entire table has gone utterly silent and everyone's looking at him, until he looks up straight into Steve's startled face. He swallows. “What? It's practically the Stark Home for Wayward Superheroes already. Bruce is here, after all.”

 

“Uh,” Steve says, looking from him to Bruce to Pepper and back again. “I wouldn't want to intrude.”

 

“In case you haven't noticed, there are, like, a hundred floors. You could keep an army here and it wouldn't be all that intrusive.”

 

“Still--”

 

“Hey, whatever. It's just a suggestion.”

 

“Right,” Steve says, and he's looking down at his plate, his cheeks flushed. Tony can't tell if it's embarrassment or irritation or both. “It's just that-- I mean, Pepper and Bruce live here too...”

 

“Oh, I don't live here,” Pepper says, just as Tony says, “Pepper has her own place.”

 

“It'd drive us both crazy if I was here twenty-four hours a day,” she explains, smiling at Tony across the table. He rolls his eyes at her, not bothering to mention that this was her decision not his. It's an argument they've had several times, and he knows it off by heart. He always loses. “I have my own apartment, although I do stay over some nights. If Tony and Bruce are happy for you to move in you certainly don't need to hesitate on my account.”

 

Being Steve, he does, of course, hesitate, and when Tony presses him for an answer – ignoring Pepper's not-so-subtle pressure on his foot – he blurts out, “It's just, I'm not exactly easy to live with. I don't have to sleep much, I eat a lot, and I'm not really good with...” he waves a hand, “gadgets and stuff.”

 

“And I keep a bull pup,” Tony mutters. When Steve looks at him inquiringly, he shakes his head. “We all have our little quirks. But hey. No pressure. Just know the offer stands, if you ever get tired of living at 101 Bland Street.”  
  


**5**

 

Tony is well aware that his particular personality is a conglomeration of sharp edges and sharper comebacks, whereas Steve is essentially Mr. Butter-Wouldn't-Melt-In-My-Mouth. Even with Bruce's stabilising influence (it's ironic, but maybe because of the Hulk he's the most Zen of all of them) the two of them make an odd couple, and once Tony has time to think the better of his impulsive offer he's fairly sure they will get along like oil and water, where the oil is also flammable and the water is also gasoline.

 

Imagine his surprise when the exact opposite happens. There are a few fights – sort of, more like quarrels, more like _disagreements_ , which mature adults can totally have occasionally – but Steve is actually less boring and more interesting the more you get to know him, and Tony wears him in like a pair of new shoes, his routine altering in incremental ways to make room for new things. Things like lunch with Steve, and going to Central Park to sketch with Steve (okay, so Steve does the sketching and Tony mostly just feeds the ducks and designs armour on his StarkPad, but it's _new_ , okay, that's the thing), and teaching Steve how to use the internet. Turns out that “not really good with gadgets and stuff” is the polite way of saying “really fucking brilliant,” and it's a delight to watch him master new concepts almost as quickly as Tony teaches them to him. Super-serum-enhanced or not, Steve's no slouch in the brains department, and while only Bruce can keep up with him in science-speak, Steve's not bad.

 

Steve's not bad at all.

 

Of course, after that, Hawkeye and Widow turn up, and that just leaves Thor, who arrives in a gust of chilly wind one evening and takes up residence in the tower as if he's always lived there. Apparently Stark's Home for Wayward Superheroes is actually a thing now. But it's cool, in a way he never imagined it could be. He won't say it's like having a family, because he doesn't know what that's like and in his experience it's pretty crappy, but it is possibly close to what it feels like to have friends. Which is nice. Weird, but nice.

 

**8**

 

The first time Tony takes a hit for Steve, it's unintentional. Mostly. He's just turned forty and the tabloids have started talking about his 'salt-and-pepper' hair like it's a hilarious pun, so he builds a newer, better suit to compensate and breaks it in spectacularly by getting knocked through several office buildings into the harbour.

 

When he comes to, Steve's sitting next to his bed reading the newspaper and Pepper's asleep on the next bed over. Instead of dreaming about drowning or even Afghanistan, when he falls asleep again all he sees is the sunlight on Pepper's hair and Steve's hands as he folds each section neatly over and over, like origami; like it's something precious.

 

**13**

 

The first time Steve takes a hit for Tony, it's definitely intentional and it's definitely not as dramatic, but it hurts twice as much for all that. Fury is on the warpath again, not yelling and loud but the kind of quiet assassins get when they're thinking real hard about where to hide the body, and he seems to have it out for Tony in particular because he can't do anything right lately, including eat, sleep or breathe. Not that he's been trying too hard, but still.

 

“Your reaction time is down .05%, Stark; you're sloppy, reckless and you still behave like you're a one-man wrecking ball instead of a member of a team,” Fury barks, his good eye fixing Tony to the spot as he leans over his desk and _glares_. Tony has a theory that, after the incident, Fury's remaining retina quadrupled in strength to compensate for the loss of his other eyeball. That would certainly explain a few things.

 

“I'm busy,” Tony tries to explain, and he is definitely _not_ slumping in his chair like a recalcitrant child sent to the principal's office, because he is a grown-ass man and a superhero. “I don't have _time_ to train 24/7, because unlike the rest of these grifters I actually have a full-time job, which requires me to do stuff other than beat supervillains into messy pulp, fun as that is.”

 

“Well, maybe you should quit your job,” Fury says, in the tone of someone making a friendly suggestion but with a look on his face that is in no way friendly. “One of them, at any rate.”

 

“Sir,” Steve interjects, before Tony can protest, and Tony kind of jumps – he may possibly have forgotten Steve was there. “Tony's business is what helps keep us afloat, you know that. If the Maria Stark Foundation didn't contribute to pay for property damages, we'd be drowning in lawsuits and rightly so. And how else will Tony be able to fulfill his contract with you?”

 

“SHIELD can foot the bill just as easily as Stark can; he can work for us.”

 

“Not gonna happen,” Tony says flatly. Steve doesn't look at him.

 

“With all due respect, sir, I feel it's important that the Avengers remain an independent task force. Being too reliant on SHIELD would be problematic for all of us. I, for one, would prefer to remain independent and I know the others agree with me.”

 

In other words, Tony thinks, keep bullying him and the entire team walks. It's – inspiring, that's what it is, how Steve can manage to make an ultimatum sound like an earnest desire to do his job.

 

The staring contest that ensues lasts a full minute, and Steve wins. After Fury leaves, with Steve's promise that they'll work on Tony's chronic inability to multitask, they glance at each other and Tony's expecting something – a lecture, a frown, even just a “now we're even” smirk. Instead Steve merely looks at him, and shakes his head. “Get some sleep,” he says, an unexpected fondness in his voice. “You look like you could use it.”

 

**21**

 

The second time Tony takes a hit for Steve it almost ends up killing him, and Pepper won't talk to him for a week after he gets out of hospital.

 

In spite of that, he'd do it again in a heartbeat, and what does that say about either of them?

 

**34**

 

He knows Steve and Pepper talk about him sometimes. He's fairly sure Pepper calls it the Tony Stark Sufferers Anonymous Club, which he's probably not supposed to know about. What he isn't sure of is whether they talk about things that aren't him – things like their shared interest in art, or ways to make otherwise scary people and their underlings run for cover using only the tone of their voice. He's starting to figure that maybe he has a type, and maybe he's also starting to run calculations about the likelihood of their particular venn diagram overlapping in all the right places, and whether they won't both punch him into next week if he voices what's on his mind.

 

“Are you jealous?” Pepper asks, when he brings the whole _so-I-noticed-you're-spending-a-lot-of-time-with-Steve_ thing up with her. She doesn't look guilty, just curious, like she could never understand why he _might_ get jealous. Sometimes the irregular potholes in her self-esteem confuse him; he'd love to sit down and puzzle out the pattern there, someday.

 

“Maybe a little,” he says, because Honesty is a thing Pepper says he doesn't do often enough, at least to the right people. “Mostly I think it's hot.”

 

She smacks him with a pillow, and he grins.

 

“You're incorrigible.”

 

“But you love me for it.”

 

He notices, however, that she doesn't deny it, and quietly recalculates the odds in favour.

 

**55**

 

After that, he starts paying closer attention to Steve as well, the way he still blushes crimson sometimes when Pepper talks to him, the lingering warmth of his hand on Tony's shoulder. He's fairly sure he's right, now; the numbers are all adding up, the pattern falling into place, but the question is whether he can get them to see it, to understand what perfect sense his equations make.

 

The next time Steve's alone in the gym, he grabs Pepper by the hand and drags her down to the lab on the pretext of signing some paperwork. The fact that Steve's ass is on prominent display on one of the monitors, thanks to the Tower's security feed, is totally a coincidence. Hey, he never claimed to be subtle.

 

She makes him turn it off after about five minutes, citing invasions of privacy and sexual harassment, but he can tell by the way her eyes linger on the screen even after he's switched it back to the usual schematics that she's thinking about it, coming to her own conclusions about his motives. Hers always has been one of the sharpest minds he knows.

 

“Are you testing me?” she asks finally, half turning towards him, her arms folded protectively across her chest. “Tony, you have to know I would never – “

 

“I was thinking of it more as a suggestion,” Tony says.

 

He watches her face; watches her expression change and settle into something like comprehension, like the unfolding clarity of a perfectly executed proof.

 

“He's hard to resist, isn't he?”

 

Tony nods. “Something about those big blue eyes and the ability to punch through solid walls. It's a lethal combination.”

 

“Do you think he'd go for it?”

 

“I'll ask him,” Tony says, adding, at her skeptical expression, “Nicely! I'll ask nicely!”  
  


Pepper just sighs, and rolls her eyes heavenwards. “Please, try not to traumatise him too badly. He is from the 1940s, you know.”

 

“I know. I'll try not to offend his delicate sensibilities too much.”

 

“He could also break you in half with his bare hands.”

 

“...I'll keep that in mind.”

 

**89**

 

Tony's idea of delicacy goes somewhat like this: he corners Steve alone in the briefing room after their next mission and kisses him full on the mouth. Steve kisses back, a slight, surprised movement of the lips, and Tony has time to think _gotcha!_ before he steps back to take in the expression on Steve's face, his hands still on Steve's wrists where he'd gripped them for balance when he leaned up to reach his mouth.

 

“So Pepper and I were thinking,” Tony says.

 

“Yes.”

 

“You didn't even let me finish what I was going to say! I had this whole speech all planned out, you know. I was going to seduce you with my genius, wear down your principled resistance with my charm. I knew I could get through to you as long as you didn't punch me in the face. It's kind of hard to be convincing when you're unconscious, which I know from bitter experience.”

 

Steve is smiling faintly, his eyes dark, a tiny crease between his eyebrows that suggests he thinks Tony is being inscrutable again.

 

“You thought I'd be that difficult to convince?”

 

“Pepper did. I didn't. The numbers never lie, Steve. Besides, I've seen the way you look at her.”

 

He's blushing. It's adorable.

 

“I didn't think it was that obvious.”

 

“She'd have told you if she minded. Besides, she looks at you right back.” He smiles, letting his mouth curl up slow in the way that Pepper says makes him look like a big cat about to pounce. A very sexy big cat. Maybe a panther. “We both look at you.”

 

Their eyes meet, and to Steve's credit he doesn't look away. “I look at you too.”

 

For that, Tony kisses him again.

 

**144**

 

Tony announces his success to Pepper by whistling the tune to _Threesome_ whenever he sees her the next day; he's fairly sure she doesn't know the song, but half-way through their business lunch with some very important clients he sees her suddenly sit up straighter, her mouth forming an 'o' of comprehension. She glares at him for the rest of the meeting, and all the way home, but as soon as the doors close behind them she yanks him close for a kiss, and Tony knows it's going to be all right.

 

And it is, surprisingly. There's a lot of _I-don't-know's_ and _sorry's_ when they first start out, but the basic equation is right, much better than the billionaire plus super-soldier foundation he had started off with. From there it's just a matter of refining the formula.

 

They exchange things: blows, epithets, nicknames, kisses. There are patterns even in this, if you look closely enough – the stuttering rhythm of Pepper's racing heartbeat, Steve's ragged breath, the thrust and release of their bodies moving together. Tony, who in spite of everything had run odds that this was the way it would all turn out, scratches the Fibonacci sequence into Steve's skin and kisses Pepper with his mouth open, and for once doesn't even try to second-guess himself. He trusts them both too much not to let him mess this up.


End file.
